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“I love having too many eggs and so you have to give them to friends,” she said. “I love the feathers they drop as gifts. I love the compost they make. I love the way they will step so gently on your lap for a bit of loving. I love their eyes and soft combs and very pointy beaks. I love how warm their feet are and how their toes curl around your fingers when you are holding them. I love their pointy bird butts when they are pecking and scratching.”

I heard an interview on the radio a while back with Sy Montgomery, the author of a book called Birdology. He said that the average chicken can recognize about 100 other chicken faces. Each chicken has a couple of friends that they like. I think 100 chicken faces would be another fun drawing to make.

While drawing my friend, above, I realized that she is like a Mary Cassatt aquatint come to life. Her hair, plus the patterns in her clothing. And maybe the meditative mood. This was my first try at drawing chickens. They have kind of a wonderful shape. You almost can’t get it wrong.

I took the liberty of making it spring in my drawing, even though it’s not, not at all.

The next day: I want to add a complementary thought about chickens, from our friend John:

Pablo Neruda writes:I am weary of chickens:no one knows what they are thinking,and they look at us with dry eyesand consider us unimportant…

[The musician] Greg Brown responds:It’s true. They do, and we are…but it’s hard to take that from a damn chicken.

Instructions: Find five things that have color (“Farbe,” in German) in February. That start with “F.” Kind of like the game “Scattergories,” or a scavenger hunt. Easy version: just think of them. Advanced version: draw pictures of them, or write about them. A poem, maybe? Here are mine: (If you look at mine and feel too influenced, just pick another alphabet letter.)

1. Food. Food is full of Farbe. You could paint or draw a “still life.” Or, as I have done, a “hold-still life.”

3. Fire. Fireplaces. Bonfires. In Vorarlberg, a region of Austria, there is a tradition of building a tall wooden tower. It is filled, sometimes with old Christmas trees. The effigy of a witch is filled with explosive powder and placed at the top. The tower is set ablaze and everyone watches and eats special pastries. When the fire reaches the witch, she explodes! Winter is banished! Our Austrian friend, Clemens, says it is “to end the winter and so spring can come.” The day to do it is on the Sunday after Ash Wednesday; this year, that would be February 17. The name of the festival is “Funken,” which just means “towers.” Better get started!

4. Foxes. Q: Is there anything more beautiful than a red fox running across the snow? A: No. But there are a lot of things there is nothing more beautiful than. As Mary Oliver said in her book-length poem, The Leaf and The Cloud, “A lifetime isn’t long enough for the beauty of this world.”

5. Flowers. Flowers from the florist. “Forced” flowers. From a friend, for a friend.